The life sciences sector is one of the most promising areas in Europe, and Barcelona is working to create an ideal ecosystem to boost the local industry.
With over 25 years of promoting life science companies, Barcelona is Spain’s leading city in the biotechnology industry, with more than 2,000 startups.
According to data published in the 2023 Biocat Report, the sector already represents 7.9% of the regional GDP, with more than 1,400 companies that generate 264,000 jobs, equivalent to 6.5% of the region’s employed population.
The BaSID (Barcelona Science Innovation District) was born this year as the first private Life Science and Innovation district in Barcelona and seeks to become the scientific hub or reference in Spain.
To achieve this, the district is being supported by various stakeholders. Earlier this year, Stoneshield Capital, through the Deeplabs platform, invested 200M euro to create the City of Science in alliance with pharmaceutical giant Bayer, allowing BaSID to establish its base in the pharmaceutical company’s facilities located in Sant Joan Despí.
Now, Barcelona Science Innovation District has closed a financing operation with CaixaBank — which was advised by DLA Pipe — to obtain a green loan of 40 million euros, according to a company press release.
This is a mortgage financing with interest rate coverage that precisely falls on the real estate assets of the BaSID Baix Llobregat and BaSID Ilumina science and innovation hub, belonging to the DeepLabs platform. The green financing has Leed Platinum and Gold accreditations.
This agreement will advance the development of new laboratories and facilities for BaSID, which currently has a total area of 75,000 square meters.
BaSID’s facilities are equipped with state-of-the-art laboratories, development areas, and specialized services and already have a community of more than 2,500 professionals dedicated to the areas of biotechnology, technology, or biomedicine, among others, and the hub is currently at 71% occupancy.
“This funding will be a very important injection for BaSID’s operations, as it allows us to continue creating and improving spaces for companies that develop top-level scientific projects, promoting interaction between professionals from different disciplines,” said Javier de Pablo, Co-CEO of DeepLabs.
It is expected that this new funding will continue to propel Barcelona as a hub for science and innovation to put Spain on the path to an important role in the Life Science industry in Europe and the world.